Empire in the New World
by Gondola
Summary: Arthur faces the loss of his most successful colony, and watches as the boy he once sheltered builds himself into a world power.


Arthur made his way through the corridor, ripping each foot up off the ground as if the floor disgusted him. His body wrenched with each step, his anger causing a dull ache in his head. Two grand doors stood at the end of the walkway, and he forced each open with the whites of his palms.

"Insolent boy!" Arthur shouted, his eyes searching for and finding their perpetrator. The blond, for once clad in more official attire, turned just in time for Arthur's palm to catch his cheek.

The hand, deft with all of Britannia's withheld frustration, struck the blond's face to the side. Arthur's skin burned. He recognized the major general who jumped, and the fist that came racing into his peripheral. The man expected a well-deserved punch; instead, the hand snatched his collar tight around his throat. Arthur resisted choking.

"What the devil do you think you're doing?" asked Alfred, his eyes burning. Arthur looked up at him, immediately softened by the traces of his paternity in Alfred's accent. The male shook him, asking with an angered edge, "_Well_?" In some dizzying want of air, Arthur stared dumbly.

The New World had beckoned with a promise of beauty, wilderness, and discovery; Europe had thrown its great powers to the land's shores in hopes of making some mark in the world. The competition for America's great expanse, or even just a sliver of golden soil, watered the mouths of prospective powers and empires alike. Magic painted the waters of the Atlantic, and deposited the gilted soil that would make a man rich. With his triumph over the Spanish Empire, Arthur made the world his, and looked to America for its foretold promise. The fruits of the land glinted in his eye and drove ambitious lifestyles into the untamed New World.

Feral men led the colony into a nation, severing British government influences - it wasn't supposed to be this way. Arthur had wrestled the colony's rebellious spirit for as long as he could; the only ones who had given in where his people, tired of wasting money on a colony of hard-headed frontiersmen. They found no point in fighting, and perhaps there was none. After the war found its conclusion, trade had resumed between the Empire and its belligerent. Trade relations remained friendly, and England remained reliant on America's plentiful productions. Arthur should have been happy that their economic relations had stayed the same, but this declaration of war had opened up wounds he had never bandaged.

"I have two wars to fight," Arthur said, tiredly.

"Then leave my sailors out of it!" Alfred shook him again. "You asked for this, Arthur, and you know it. You're an _empire_, damn you, can't you fight your wars without kidnapping my citizens?"

In reality, Arthur had no idea why he'd come down like this. He'd had the intention of striking sense into the boy, but with the idea that Alfred was actually under his wing. Of course, he recognized that Alfred was sovereign - the fact weighed heavy on his mind nearly every passing day - but somehow, it had escaped him that he couldn't come down through the Atlantic just to slap the boy. He didn't belong to him, he had no affiliation to the British Empire except as an economical partner. All the anger he'd had before now festered in his temples, causing yet another ache. He would have rubbed them, had the boy not caught both his hands and pushed them into his gut.

"I'm at war with you, so you have to leave here. How did you even get here without being arrested?" Alfred glared at him.

Arthur returned the look. He was an empire, dammit, and no patchwork nation had right to usurp him. But every time he looked at Alfred's sun-swarthed skin, he was suddenly caught in some stupor, remembering the boy as he had been young. He had found joy in the color of Alfred's skin, wishing he had the time to lounge in the browning sun. But his home was a dark cave of a place, and the chest burns he felt in London melted away with the sweet air of a land untouched. He could never forget why he loved America so much. Romanticism had swept him up in its prose and left him in want of his rebellious colony.

Even the polar colony above him bore no comparison to the valleys, mountains, and plains of great America. Alfred's blue eyes were reminiscent of his land's promising skies, cloudless where England had rain.

Whether Arthur knew it or not, there remained in Alfred a certain amount of respect for the empire that raised him. Arthur held in his palm the better part of the whole world, and that was something to behold. Sometimes it was hard to believe his success, simply because the man himself could seem so weak. Sure, his country and his people were strong, but Arthur himself... He carried a lot on his shoulders.

"Go," Alfred said, pushing the man's shoulders back. He kept his frown on him. The man's head raised, and, as if he was drunk, he stumbled back. Only pain sent him away, and Arthur hurried out of the White House with a hand clenching his gut.


End file.
